Career Progression
How careers grow at Hardal, and what you can expect from us.
We're honest about this: we don't have a formal career ladder. No L3, L4, L5. No checklist of competencies. We think those systems create the wrong incentives at a company our size.
What we have instead is simpler: if the company grows and you're a meaningful reason why, your compensation and responsibilities grow with it.
How you actually progress here
Ship things that matter. The clearest path to more responsibility is doing work that has visible impact - landing a customer, shipping a feature that gets used, fixing something that was silently hurting retention. People who do this consistently get more ownership, not more check-ins.
Make others better. You progress faster when the people around you improve because of you. Writing good internal docs, giving honest feedback, helping someone get unstuck - all of this compounds. It's not just about your individual output.
Grow your scope, not just your skills. The difference between a mid-level and a senior person at Hardal isn't just technical skill. It's how much of the problem they see and own. A senior engineer cares about whether the thing they built is actually used. A senior salesperson cares about whether the customer succeeds, not just whether the deal closed.
What we don't do
We don't give promotions based on tenure. Spending two years at Hardal does not automatically mean a raise or a new title.
We don't have formal performance reviews on a fixed cadence. We do have regular 1:1s and we give feedback continuously. If something isn't working, you'll hear about it before a review cycle.
We don't give titles to make people feel better. Title inflation is the beginning of the end for small companies.
Compensation
We aim to pay fairly for the role and location. We review compensation annually and when the company hits significant milestones. We're transparent about the logic behind numbers.
We also have equity. If you joined early and help get us to a significant outcome, that equity has real value. We don't hand equity out carelessly - it's meaningful to us and we want it to be meaningful to you.
See the Equity & Profit Sharing page for details.
What to do if you want to grow
The best approach is direct. Tell your manager (or either founder) what kind of work you want to do more of and where you want to be in 12 months. We'll tell you honestly whether we see a path there and what the gap looks like.
We can't guarantee a specific role in 12 months - we don't always know what we'll need. But we can guarantee that people who contribute to Hardal's growth will be taken care of.
If things aren't working
If you feel stuck or uncertain about your direction, say so early. We'd rather have an honest conversation when things are slightly off than a painful one when they've gone wrong.
If it turns out Hardal isn't the right place for where you want to go, we'd rather help you figure that out and part on good terms than have you quietly disengaged.